


rocking the child

by ahtohallan_calling



Category: Frozen (Disney Movies)
Genre: Bearstoff, F/M, and thank you creative director gabi, fic of a fic, johanna is my favorite person
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-02
Updated: 2020-01-02
Packaged: 2021-02-27 04:09:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,089
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22090840
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ahtohallan_calling/pseuds/ahtohallan_calling
Summary: Kristoff may be sleeping for a year to break the curse, but other kinds of magic are at work as well.{a companion piece to jericks3's East of the Sun, West of the Moon}
Relationships: Anna/Kristoff (Disney)
Comments: 9
Kudos: 63





	rocking the child

**Author's Note:**

> basically this is Kristoff's dreams/flashbacks/visions while he's in Ahtohallan!
> 
> THANK YOU Johanna for agreeing to let me write fic of your fic because I LOOOOOVE IT.
> 
> If you haven't read EotSWotM yet, it's here: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21684961/chapters/51718648

  
  


There is a humming in his bones.

It’s nothing like the flutter in his chest that first night when Anna ran into him, or the shiver of anticipation just before she’d finally kissed him, or the trembling in his hands when she had sworn to be his true North or the way he’d shuddered at the brush of her bare skin last night as she’d gasped and fallen apart against him, hands still fisted in his hair.

It’s like the slap of cold water on bare skin, the sear of ice on his tongue, the hiss in the air just before the lightning strikes.

And the closer he gets to Ahtohallan, the louder it gets.

He still hears her, over the humming and the waves and the thrumming of the crystal and the pounding of his heart, just the way he knows he will for the next three hundred and sixty-five nights.

_ I love you _ , and in his heart he howls it back, hoping magic will grant him mercy for once and let her hear. 

* * *

Anna’s hand is pressed against his chest, just over his heart, her breathing ragged against the crook of his neck, and all of her against and around him is heated and her hand is warmest of all and he cries out and comes undone and her fingers are not just warm they’re  _ burning _ and all of a sudden Anna is there on the bed but she is alone, and her hand is curled around something hanging from her neck.

Little sobs and great gasps are escaping her, each one ripping a new wound in his heart. He tries to reach out, to go to her, but something catches at him, pulling him back, no matter how hard he fights.

_ Let me hold her _ , he thinks, panic ripping through him as a fresh wave of saltwater crests and courses down her cheeks; he pulls again and is yanked back hard enough it feels like the wind has been knocked out of him if such a thing can happen in whatever realm this is.

He falls to his knees or whatever it is he has here and hears her broken little whispers as she runs her thumb over the pendant she’s clutching. “Please come back,” she chokes out, “please, I need you.”

_ I never left, _ he shouts, but she cannot hear.

* * *

Mama told him always keep his hat on, but when he fell the first time it got all covered in snow, and when he put it back on it only made things worse so then he took it back off and his hands were shaking so hard he dropped it and now he doesn’t know if that was the right thing to do and he’s so cold it feels like burning.

He doesn’t know how he got lost exactly but he is, and one time on TV he saw a show where the man explained how to find your way by looking at the moss on the trees or the stars in the sky but all he can see is white, even when he holds his hand up in front of his face. All the wind makes his eyes water, and the little tears cling to his eyelashes and freeze there.

He was holding on to Sven’s harness for a while but then his hands got too stiff and that’s when he fell and for a little bit he could feel little nudges on his shoulder but it’s been a long time now and he lost him even though he promised the day he got him to always take care of him because they were best friends, and he didn’t mean to break the promise but he has. And now new hot tears start to roll, stinging the chapped skin of his cheeks. If Mama was here she’d give him hot chocolate with cinnamon and hold him tight tight tight until he got warm again but she’s not here and he doesn’t know where she is and more importantly he doesn’t know where  _ he _ is and one time in school they read a book about a boy who got lost like this and survived with just an axe but that was a book and this was real life and he just wants to lay down and take a nap because the snow looks like Mama’s big fluffy blanket that they used to wiggle when they made the bed so it looked like waves and he loves that blanket so he lays down and he closes his eyes and already he feels better.

He must be falling asleep real fast or maybe Mama’s watching TV in the next room because he hears these funny voices that aren’t talking with real words but that’s okay, he can sleep with a little noise, and then Mama picks him up to take him to his own bed because he’s a big boy now so they don’t share any more except when he has bad dreams and then it’s okay.

“You’ll be okay, baby,” Mama says, but her voice is kinda funny and her hands are a little rough. “We can take care of you. Is that okay?”

_ Ok, Mama, _ he thinks, and she says some more and he just nods and nods or maybe he’s just shivering, and she starts humming and at first it’s nice but then it gets louder and louder and his arms feel itchy and it’s too bright and maybe this is one of those bad dreams but suddenly it’s quiet again and he’s so tired he just goes right to sleep.

* * *

Beneath her freckles, Anna looks so pale as she slumps against the bathtub that for a second he thinks maybe she’s dead and that’s not fair because he’s the one who’s supposed to leave but then she lets out a little groan and he remembers  _ oh yes, I already left _ , and he hates himself for it all over again because someone should be there holding her and instead she’s alone.

She’s got one hand running over the edge of the ring and the other clutching a little square of paper, and she’s shaking so hard he can’t quite make out what it is, just sees a black square and in the middle a little white blob, and he knows he’s seen one of these before but he can’t quite place the memory, and just as it’s on the tip of his tongue Anna flies upright, dropping the ring as she clutches the rim of the toilet and he’s back in darkness. 

* * *

He’s been here long enough now that he’s gotten his bearings, knows he’s dreaming, but he stays asleep anyway. One time he saw it on late-night TV, some guy with frizzy hair talking about lucid dreaming and how it’s really some kind of magic. The presenter had looked pretty skeptical at that, and now Kristoff wishes he remembered the frizzy hair guy’s name so he could call him up and say  _ hey buddy, you’ll never believe it, look who’s laughing now. _

Most of the time his dreams are just memories, good and bad all mixed up and folded together, but even more often than that it’s just darkness and the sound of the waves lulling him back into the deepest kind of sleep until a memory crests again.

But every once in a while he gets really lucky and catches a glimpse of red hair or feels the brush of a little hand over his chest, and he can pretend that the year’s already up, and he’s back home with her. It’s strange, though, that when he dreams of Anna it’s not always memories; sometimes it’s like whatever magic keeps him here has dredged through his heart and pulled out the little secret things he longs for just to taunt him.

Like right now; at first it was just dark but it was so quiet, no waves at all which he thought was odd, but then he noticed a faint light and a bit of movement to his right, and he looked to his left and there was Anna, her profile illuminated by the glow. This time she had the ring in both hands, and she was staring up at the ceiling like she was counting stars.

The sound of the waves starts, and he’s disappointed because it’s been a while since he’d gotten a glimpse of her past or future and he isn’t ready to roll back into that dreamless sleep, but then he realizes it isn’t quite waves after all; it’s a  _ whooshwhooshwhoosh  _ and somehow Anna hears it too and turns and looks right at him and whispers, “That’s him?”

He nearly shouts for joy, but then he realizes she’s looking right past him, and he turns back and looks at the screen and it’s just like that paper she was holding the last time only a little bit different and he thinks he can tell what it is right now but he’s not sure until he turns back and looks closer and sees the bared swell of her stomach, and he wants to thank whatever power it is sending him these dreams for reminding him what all this is for, for the future they’re going to have together someday, and he’s caught up in watching and wondering and  _ longing _ and then Anna drops the ring to pull her shirt back down and then it is just the waves again after all.

* * *

“Babyen min, sønnen min.”

“Mamma,” he gasps, and she smiles.

He’s big and small and she’s there and not, but it doesn’t matter in this place where sleeping is waking and dreaming is living or maybe it’s all the other way around, but he doesn’t care because he hasn’t seen her smile at him like this since the last time she tucked him in to sleep. 

“Jeg savner deg så mye,” he sobs,  _ I miss you so much,  _ and she wraps him up in her arms, ensconcing him in warmth, and he did not remember how much he had yearned to be held like this one last time until he realizes he is weeping. 

“Jeg er med deg,” she promises. “Og du er der.”

But how can she be here now, how can he be there with Anna?

“Mamma, jeg forstår ikke noe, I don’t understand,” he says, his voice trembling, and she smiles. 

“Not all magic is a curse,” she says, this time in a language he doesn’t know but somehow comprehends. “And sometimes even curses want to be broken just a little.”

He buries his face in her shoulder, smelling the perfume he and Pappa picked out special for her birthday, and she strokes his hair, the way she always did when he had trouble sleeping. She starts singing softly in his ear, the same lullaby that he had hummed to Anna when she had slept in his arms. “Bissam, bissam bådne…”

* * *

Anna is asleep in a sweater that he recognizes, with one hand on the ring and one hand on her belly like she needs something to hold onto and that’s all she’s got, and he thinks  _ I’m here too, hold on to me _ .

He knows she can’t, that’s not how this strange dream magic works but he sees the glimmer of barely-dried tear tracks down her cheeks, and he closes his eyes and remembers what it feels like to hold her she sleeps, the press of her shoulders against the plane of his chest and her little legs reaching back to tangle with his and the top of her hair tickling his chin and all of her warm and solid and soft and suddenly in his daydream he feels her move, so he blinks and somehow he’s there with her on the bed, as if he remembered so well he managed to make it so.

He drops a hesitant hand over the curve of her stomach and presses it there, flaring his fingers, and feels her snuggle back against him, as if by some miracle she knows he’s there. This is what he had longed for, all those unending hours when he’d been trapped in a body that never really felt like his own; of course he’d yearned to kiss and caress and-- well, do  _ other things _ \-- but most of all he’d wanted to hold her, to know how it felt to surround her, shelter her; to let her nuzzle against his shoulder, to entwine her fingers with his own and hold on tight.

There’s a little nudge against the palm of his hand, and if he’s breathing he stops. Maybe this is just a vision of the future but it sure as hell feels like right now. “Anna?” he gasps out of habit, and he feels her start to turn and whisper, “ _ Kristoff _ ?” but it’s like a spell has been broken, and he’s gone.

* * *

He had all but given up. When he was young the transformation felt only like a particularly strong wave of goosebumps, but the older he gets, the more it feels like tearing and cracking and fainting and falling all at once. That was alright, though; he wouldn’t have to feel all that much longer. He had told the trolls that after the next solstice in seven years’ time he’d be ready to make the transformation permanent, but lately he’d been mulling over thoughts of asking them to just go ahead and do it now. There were those who would miss him, of course, but not terribly; they’d find his house empty and assume he’d just moved on, and they would too without much trouble. Sven would still be with him, and the trolls, and already that was more of life than he had in his human form. 

He had come down to the village on just a quick errand, too distracted by the thought that maybe he’d just ask them to go on and do it tonight to notice that someone else was coming through the door, someone  _ new _ with the most beautiful shade of hair he’d ever seen, and she didn’t see him either so he just moved her out of the way as carefully as he could, and she looked up at him with wide eyes and whispered “ _ whoa. _ ”

He was thinking the same thing, and he continued to do so as he left, sneaking a last glance over his shoulder.  _ What a shame,  _ he thought ruefully,  _ that I won’t ever see her again. _

But then later, when he was standing with Sven, trying to get his opinion on the matter of his transformation, there was a clatter of stones as she fell practically at his feet. 

He had never really been one for miracles and signs, but, well— he was a man who turned into a bear and back again; perhaps it was time he started believing. 

* * *

He’s in the deepest kind of sleep where the oldest magic dwells when he hears that sweet voice he longs for hissing, “ _ Jesusshittingfuckgoddamn _ ,” and it would be funny to hear such a violent stream of swearing coming from her if the words hadn’t spilled out in a ragged gasp of pain, and then she’s gone again. 

Usually when all the dreams fade and it’s just the darkness he falls into  _ real _ sleep, the hibernation that’s where the transformation goes on, but this time he can’t; it’s the most awake he’s felt in however long he’s been down here, and the most scared. If the little flashes he’s been getting really  _ aren’t _ just visions of the future, then somewhere out there Anna is hurting, and he’s still not there to help her, and if what he’s starting to really truly hope for is what’s happening then that means he’s not going to be there for—

He slams into a vision of bright lights and beeping as a building scream tears its way through Anna, her face too-white and twisted beneath her mane of flaming hair. She’s clenching her first around the ring in one hand and clinging to Elsa with the other, and all he can think is  _ that should be me, I should be there, they are mine and I am here but not and they don’t know,  _ and Anna falls back against the pillow for a second, tears and sweat streaming down her face as she gasps for air, and he surges towards her again hoping for that little bit of mercy again so she can feel him and know he’s there but just as his fingers graze against her face she lunges forward again with a cry, dropping the ring as a nurse takes her arm, and he’s thrown back into darkness with a scream of his own.

* * *

There had been only flashes for a long while, fitful glimpses of past and present and future and darkness and light and waves and cold all flickering one after the another, and he had known that he was starting to wake up, and then he had heard her screaming like he had in that last terrible dream and he had just started  _ running _ , terrified that something was still wrong and he wouldn’t make it again and then suddenly there she was and he couldn’t feel the cold at all. 

He feels it now, of course, and there’s no real escaping from it when he’s outdoors, no more fur and bulk to keep him warm, but that’s alright; he has found a different kind of shelter. 

Anna is asleep; right after he had brought Bjorn in she had dozed back off. But his son—  _ his son, _ he will never stop marveling at that— is wide awake, staring up at him with wide brown eyes. 

“Little bear,” he murmurs, picking him up and nestling him in his arms, “sønnen min, you need to rest.”

Bjorn just watches him, instinctively curling and uncurling his tiny hand. Kristoff offers him a broad finger, and he grasps it tightly, already strong as his namesake. 

He stands, makes his way to the window, gazes out at the field of stars and snow. “Look, little bear, at this beautiful world we’ve got.” 

Bjorn coos, squeezing his finger a little tighter, and Kristoff presses a kiss to his velvet soft forehead. He starts to rock his son, gentle and easy, just the way he knows he was once held with just as much love, and sings the same words he knows will be passed on someday years from now and again years from then. “Bissam, bissam bådne…”

**Author's Note:**

> the lullaby: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TwpbZsvEETQ


End file.
